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Apple declined to implement 16 Web APIs in Safari due to privacy concerns

(www.zdnet.com)
428 points coronadisaster | 5 comments | 29 Jun 20 10:16 UTC | HN request time: 0.87s | source
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thayne ◴[29 Jun 20 18:40 UTC] No.23680835[source]▶
There may be some legitimate fingerprinting concenrs. But given the list of API's it's hard not to see this as Apple crippling PWAs to prevent them from replacing native iOS apps (and hurting Apple's revenue from the Apple tax).

And maybe I'm missing something, but wouldn't the fingerprinting concern be mitigated by the fact the app has to ask for permission before using the API? If an app that doesn't have to do with MIDI asks for permission to use my MIDI device, I'm going to be instantly suspicious.

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Joeri ◴[29 Jun 20 21:28 UTC] No.23683342[source]▶
I don’t even want these 16 api’s. I want a way to do notifications and a way to store more than 50 mb on ios. Sure, make me and the user jump through hoops to make sure I’m not abusive, but with those two there are a ton of apps which I can build as pwa’s.

The app clips feature they showed? That should have been a qr code triggered pwa with notifications, except everybody had to build it as an app because they couldn’t do notifications, and then apple used the cumbersome nature of those apps as the reason for app clips. It’s the snake eating its own tail, and I’m getting IE6 vibes because microsoft also strategically stopped improving IE for web apps because they wanted to push app developers to native because of the improved user experience. Yeah, the web is worse, but worse is better.

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larme ◴[29 Jun 20 21:37 UTC] No.23683457[source]▶
I’m very glad a web page cannot store 50mb data and send notification to me.

You only think from a developer’s perspective. What if you are the user receiving 50 notification requirement a day from a web browser?

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danudey ◴[29 Jun 20 22:02 UTC] No.23683779[source]▶
Then you tap on the notification and say "turn off" and then it stops happening.
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jakear ◴[30 Jun 20 00:01 UTC] No.23684975[source]▶
This isn’t able notifications, this is about the “do you want to allow notifications” prompts. Crazy how in the same HN community you have people on one post complaining that there are too damn many cookie/gdpr/etc prompts, then on the next post asking for additional notification prompts. What ever happened to going to a website and consuming its content and leaving?

I get that making an app instead of a PWA is a pain the in the ass, but the reason I pay $$$ to Apple is so that pains like that exist in the developer’s ass instead of mine. I want to be in their walled garden and I want them to keep lazy developers and poor UX out.

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schwartzworld ◴[30 Jun 20 11:57 UTC] No.23689164[source]▶
> Whatever happened to going to a website and consuming it's content and leaving?

The internet became more powerful so it does more things. The PWA spec allows for zero-install apps that are just as performant (or more) than native apps. You can view their network requests in the console, and they run in a sandboxed environment. You want to download and install a binary for something that can be accomplished in a few kb of cached JavaScript?

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1. jakear ◴[30 Jun 20 12:36 UTC] No.23689388[source]▶
I don’t want any websites sending me any notifications ever.

I don’t want any websites triggering the browser to ask me if they can send me notifications.

I don’t want any websites asking me if they can ask the browser to ask me to send me notifications.

I don’t want any websites using their classic scams like tiny “x” buttons that have insufficient contrast and are impossible to click on a mobile device anyways to ask me if they can ask the browser to send me notifications.

I don’t want to see my grandma dealing with scammers who trick her into allowing potentially phicious notifications that she doesn’t know how to cancel, or even what the source is.

I want developers to jump through as many bullshit hoops as possible before even having the chance to send me notifications. Apple and their review prices help me out there, and for all above points.

It seems to me like you believe everyone is the same as you: they value small package size, they personally audit all code they run, they want random corporations to have an easier time getting a presence on their home screen, and they’d be able to easily identify and stop all corporate badgering they do end up receiving. I don’t think any of those are true even for me (someone in the industry), let alone the population at large.

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2. swiley ◴[30 Jun 20 12:55 UTC] No.23689517[source]▶
> I don’t want any websites sending me any notifications ever.

> I don’t want any websites triggering the browser to ask me if they can send me notifications

That’s fine for you but some of us who are in niche communities or have weird applications don’t want to wait for a VC to fund the development of a native app.

Right now I can’t get notifications from IRC at all which pushes me and everyone else to centralized chat services. This has distorted the evolution of the internet and I would argue has contributed heavily to the “fake news” problem.

> It seems to me like you believe everyone is the same as you

You’re projecting. We want a feature that the user can disable, not ever being able to use this at all means everyone has to want the same things you do.

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3. jakear ◴[30 Jun 20 16:13 UTC] No.23691575[source]▶
I clearly outline how “a feature the user can disable” is the same as “a gdpr/cookie/telemetry/etc prompt the user can reject”

It doesn’t take a VC to make an app, I made some starting in HS (with push, yes), and you can too. Be the change you wish to see.

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4. schwartzworld ◴[30 Jun 20 19:23 UTC] No.23693781[source]▶
> I don’t want any websites sending me any notifications ever.

I agree with you actually, but not everybody does. Some people do want push notifications when they get a new email or Facebook update. I wish it weren't so, but it is.

> I don’t want any websites triggering the browser to ask me if they can send me notifications.

> I don’t want any websites asking me if they can ask the browser to ask me to send me notifications.

> I don’t want any websites using their classic scams like tiny “x” buttons...

Given that we live in a world where there are notifications, you have the choice to disable them on your device, or decline them on a site by site basis. For your grandma, I'd suggest the former strategy.

But if you don't want the site to ask you, and you don't want the browser to ask you, and you don't want to disable them for all sites, you're setting yourself up for disappointment. All the whining isn't going to bring back 90s internet.

> It seems to me like you believe everyone is the same as you: they value small package size, they personally audit all code they run, they want random corporations to have an easier time getting a presence on their home screen, and they’d be able to easily identify and stop all corporate badgering they do end up receiving

What's the difference between a native app asking to send you notifications vs a web app?

5. swiley ◴[01 Jul 20 22:31 UTC] No.23707568{3}[source]▶
>I clearly outline how “a feature the user can disable” is the same as “a gdpr/cookie/telemetry/etc prompt the user can reject”

You're clearly wrong then. iOS already does something similar with location and doesn't suffer from this problem.

>It doesn’t take a VC to make an app, I made some starting in HS (with push, yes), and you can too. Be the change you wish to see.

That's actually kind of upsetting. On my other machines I do fix problems. The cost of volunteering to deal with apple's shitty phone is an overpriced machine where even the old used desktops are more expensive than the modern one I just built, the time it takes to learn a new language and an (IMO pretty crap) environment (GUI toolkit not withstanding,) the time it takes to maintain an app for a platform with constant API churn, and $100 a year for a developer license (nope, you can't use push notifications without paying this.)

Here's the change I want to see: people abandoning an abusive company. I'm buying a pinephone so that the next time I have a problem I can deal with it without having to buy the beater car equivalent of a computer (and spending as much.)